1) Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to tracking systems, and more particularly to a system and method for locating and preventing the loss of personal items and the like within a predefined zone.
2) Prior Art and Statement of the Problem
People are carrying more and more personal items in their everyday lives to improve their communication, entertainment, and organization. In addition to carrying keys, a means for carrying money, credit cards. ID cards, possibly medicine, food, etc.; most people also carry a cell phone, and many carry some type of other digital device, such as a calculator, a hand-held computer, cameras or a scanning device. Unless these items are physically attached to the person then there is a high probability that they will be left or lost at some point in time. To complicate the scenario, all of these items are mass produced, and in crowed places many people will have the same color cell phone, or suitcase, or computer bag, or briefcase, or purse, and it is very easy to simply mistake another's personal item for one's own.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,148,801 to Crabtree et al. discloses a system for locating objects such as people, pets, and personal articles, wherein a transceiver is attached to the person, animal, or item to be tracked and a handheld locator device is employed to transmit a locator signal containing an address code to the transceiver. Upon receipt of a signal, the transceiver compares the address code contained in the locator signal with an address code stored in the transceiver. If the two codes are same, the transceiver sends a return signal back to the locator device. The locator device uses this return signal to determine the distance and/or direction of the transceiver from the user's location. The system allows a user to select from a multiple number of items to locate and allows multiple users to search for different articles within the same general area without interference.
What is needed is a system and method that prevents the loss of personal items, as well as locate and identify them. The system and method aid the user in not only locating an item, but also notifies the user when an item is outside a predetermined zone or range of the user. Such a system would prevent the loss of most items, and significantly narrow the geographic area that needs to be searched if an item is forgotten, misplaced, or otherwise missing, because the user is quickly made aware that the item is no longer within a specified distance of the user.